When I first joined steemit, I used to use bots for my 'really great fictions'. Nothing big. Usually 1 Steem sent to smartmarket or minnowbooster.

Then I realized most curator guilds won't consider my stories if I use bots so I stopped. That was a good move as usually I get a major curie upvote once a month.

I haven't used the promotion tab coz I rarely even check it. Besides, using bots doesn't seem like a good investment these days.

The only promotion I do is to drop my links in post-promotion rooms on discord servers.

But that's just for me. I'm mostly a contest guy so I get audience from the organisers of the contests, other contestants and a few regular visitors